Sprout Magazine

Five Reasons to Watch Orphan Black

I have no idea where you’ve been, what planet you have traveled to, why you’ve just gotten cable or internet for the first time in your life yesterday, or why you like to be unhappy, but no matter the circumstance that this article finds you, I just have one thing to say: welcome to the world. We’ve been waiting. Orphan Black is currently in its second season, but don’t feel discouraged! We’re only on our fourth episode. There’s still time for you to catch up, and you will need to catch up. This isn’t one of those shows that you can just start in the second season and wish your way to the end. So, to give you a little pep talk, I have composed a list of the five reasons you need to be watching Orphan Black. Here we go, kiddos.

Theses guys:They may look harmless to you, but that’s because you don’t know them the way the Clone Club does. Graeme Manson and John Fawcett are masters of deception. They’re the type of creators that will lead you up a mountain, and right when you think, “Oh, this is nice! Look at the view,” they’ll Jedi mind trick you into thinking you’re in a lake, then drown you in it. Just vicious, but perfect for TV. One of the most important reasons that Orphan Black has such a large fanbase is because of the plot. It’s stuffed with action, twists, and everything to keep the viewers guessing. You can’t trust anyone or anything because everything you see has the potential to be a lie. Manson and Fawcett also have a flair for the dramatics. From the first episode of season one, it’s clear that OB just goes there. They take seemingly normal, yet flawed characters and place them in extremely strenuous, off-the-wall situations. How many people can raise their hands and say that they woke up one morning to discover that they were clones? Been shot at? Been forced to marry an emphatic religious nutjob? Sure, these are all plausible things that could happen, but who are they happening to? Not me. Probably not you either. This is the kind of stuff that happens to Sally Random, who I’ve never met and lives nowhere near me. This sci-fi is a little more science than fiction, and that’s probably why OB has a certain shock value to it. They bring the crazy.

Fact: Tatiana Maslany is EVERYTHING. Nothing is truer than that statement because in Orphan Black, TatMas (cool nickname? Yes? No?) is the beginning and end of every five minutes of your life. Not only is she tasked with the job of playing whoever Manson and Fawcett come up with, but she has also been holding down the OB fort every week by maintaining the identities of five main characters. Alison Hendrix, Sarah Manning, Helena, Cosima Niehaus, and Rachel Duncan are extraordinarily different clones who share relatively the same genetic material and are therefore, identical. Forget the long hours spent in the makeup chair getting Cos’ dreads wig on or Rachel’s blonde bob, and think about TatMas (okay, I’ll stop with that) actually becoming another person. It’s like The United States of Tara, except these people are all supposed to be real.

There’s just something about Alison Hendrix. I’m pretty sure it’s the drugs, but, recently, Alison is on the fast track to becoming my Fave. She gives such a good representation of suburban housewife hot mess. Out of all the clones who are still alive, she seems the most stereotypically “normal.” The house, the kids, soccer practice, minivan, stuck-up friends, husband that’s a lug. It’s like checking off boxes for what it takes to be perfect, except Alison is far from it. At this point, I watch every week, in large part, for Alison to crack up. The woman has tiny bottles of liquor stashed in her purse. She pops pills like she saw a sale at Costco and bought them in bulk, so she’s trying to get rid of them before the expiration date. And probably my favorite thing about Alison is that she always looks like this:

Clonesbians! How many lesbian couples are there on TV right now? Maybe I’m missing a few buses, but hmmm, out of all the shows I watch, there’s a gay guy in the closet (Nashville), a bisexual succubus (Lost Girl), and a dreadlock-wearing, pot-smoking, Cali-born scientist (Orphan Black). Let’s have a round of applause for Cosima Niehaus, the hottest clone on OB! She and Delphine, collectively known as “Cophine,” make up one of the most popular pairings in the show. Personally, I’m not a Cophine fan, but review the first question I asked when I began #4. The funny thing is, Cos has so much brain that you’d think out of all the clones, she’d be the one more inclined to use hers, but when it comes to Delphine, it’s like there’s those silly cartoon birds leading our Cos right off a cliff. Every time she tries to be suspicious of Delphine, she gets caught up looking at that butt, and we lose her! Sometimes, I just want to shake our girl, and tell her to focus. I don’t know for sure that Delphine is up to no good, but I don’t trust her all the same!

The clone soup would be nothing if there was no Fe to stir the pot. Felix is everyone’s brother. In this hen house, stuffed with strong, independent, and especially badass female characters, Fe adds a certain flair, characterized by ‘tude and butt cheeks, that serious-man-face Art and plunky monitor boys can’t give. For starters, he’s the type of character that you always wonder about. Hm, what’s Fe going to wear today? Is Fe painting a naked man this afternoon? Aside from his antics, Fe is the backbone, the central structure of the Clone Club. He will lie, cheat, steal, help you commit identity theft because all of his chips are in for his sisters, and that’s why he’s vital to the show as one of the most lovable characters. I promise you there is no other character on television right now with this much sass!

Whether I’ve convinced you or not to watch the show, the most important thing you must remember, is that it doesn’t matter. Just do as I say!

Sincerely Written,

Keyoka

If you enjoyed Keyoka’s article and would like to read others like it, you can read the rest of her work HERE. You can also follow her on Twitter @keyokakinzy.